


The Night After the End of the World

by thundercrackfic



Series: Ineffably Soft [1]
Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Angel and Demon True Forms (Good Omens), Aziraphale's True Form (Good Omens), Canon Compliant, Crowley's True Form (Good Omens), Fluff, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Hurt Crowley (Good Omens), Ineffable Husbands (Good Omens), M/M, Other, Pre-Scene: Body Swap (Good Omens), The Night At Crowley's Flat (Good Omens), Wingfic, Wings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-20
Updated: 2019-10-20
Packaged: 2020-12-24 22:34:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,573
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21107102
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thundercrackfic/pseuds/thundercrackfic
Summary: Aziraphale and Crowley give each other comfort as they face what may be their last hours of existence.





	The Night After the End of the World

“Wake up, my dear. We’ve arrived.”

Crowley mumbled something and unfolded his limbs, following Aziraphale out of the bus. The faint scent of citrus and sandalwood told him Aziraphale had performed some miracle for the confused bus driver.

It was strange to see Aziraphale in his flat. His softness didn’t belong among the sharp angles and hard gray floors. Under normal circumstances, the angel would have wandered through the rooms, chattering about the furnishings, but nothing was normal on this night.

“Sitting room’s in there,” Crowley said, gesturing. “I’ll bring wine.”

Each of them was lost in thought as they drank their first glasses. After pouring the second glass, Aziraphale asked, “What do you suppose they are going to do to us?”

Crowley smirked. “They’re not very creative down there. Only question I have is how they’re going to get their hands on holy water. I suspect upstairs would be delighted to oblige them.”

Aziraphale looked stricken. “Ah,” was all he said.

It struck Crowley that any moment, now, might be his last with Aziraphale. Six thousand years, coming to an end. He slouched forward, elbows on his knees, head hanging. “Fuck,” he said.

There was a warm pressure on his back. Aziraphale’s hand, a gesture of connection, of support. They didn’t touch each other, usually. It was too close. Today had brought many changes.

A tiny whiff of Aziraphale’s magic, a heavier pressure from his hand, and Crowley exhaled a long sigh as Aziraphale’s contact extended into the dimension just one over from Earth, where Crowley’s wings existed. Aziraphale petted Crowley’s ragged feathers, smoothing them. A warmth spread from Crowley’s back, tamping down the existential terror he felt, just a little bit.

His angel. Crowley did not deserve such compassion. Had always resolved, each time they met, that it would be the last, that he’d stay away from him in the future, knowing that his presence close to Aziraphale risked the angel’s Falling. But Crowley, the original tempter, couldn’t himself resist the temptation of the angel’s kindness, and always returned. And now Aziraphale was likely as doomed as he was.

Crowley felt full of what he wanted to say to Aziraphale, but it was too difficult. The human form was no good for this kind of thing.

Maybe, just once, here at the end of it all, Crowley could see Aziraphale’s heavenly form. It might burn him, and it would certainly expose him, but Crowley was weak and curious and already in mourning for what was about to happen to them.

He placed a hand on Aziraphale’s knee. Aziraphale immediately covered it with the one that wasn’t stroking Crowley’s back. Crowley exerted a little magic, mirroring Aziraphale’s, and both of their wings manifested, semi-furled, wingtips hanging behind the couch. “Angel,” he said. “I would like to see your true form, before the end. Will you permit me?”

Aziraphale licked his lips. “Are you quite sure? It might hurt you.”

Crowley smirked again. “As long as I’m feeling pain, I know I still exist. ‘S not all bad.”

Aziraphale looked at him for a few moments, his blue eyes flicking through a variety of emotions. Crowley stared back unblinkingly. “All right,” Aziraphale said. He pulled his hand away from Crowley’s back, carefully avoiding the damaged primaries, and clasped Crowley’s hand in both of his. “Ready?”

Crowley nodded. They both took a breath, and exerted an effort.

The flat was gone. They were in an ethereal plane, and Aziraphale’s presence was blinding to all the senses. Brilliant white light, tinged with gold and silver, shone from his extended wings, while a second pair furled his body in gleaming feathers. A deep rumbling from the wings accompanied their light, vibrating the air around him. Four faces, human and ox and lion and eagle, gazed fiercely in all directions, and their eight eyes were multiplied all over him, gleaming out of his brilliance. He was surrounded by pleasurable scents – incense, perfumes, aromas from delicious food and drink, each individually distinguishable and collectively overwhelming.

The appearance might have been terrifying, if it weren’t accompanied by Aziraphale’s naked soul. He radiated love, great waves of it emanating from the core of his being, love for everything in Creation. He was a bottomless well of love, pouring outward, and to Crowley, who’d been bereft of divine love for six thousand years, it felt like he might drown in it. Crowley flinched from it, knowing that he was Fallen, and not deserving to ever feel anything like this again.

At that thought, there was another wave of emotion from Aziraphale: compassion, concern. Pity for the wreck of Crowley’s soul, a writing mass of blackness on the ethereal plane, a confused morass of snaky heads and tails and shattered wings. Aziraphale glowed with infinite love for all of Creation, yes, but a lesser infinity of love for Crowley, too. Nothing his angel could do was wrong, but that certainty warred with the certainty that Crowley should not be the recipient of such devotion. Crowley was made to suffer; he could not have this.

Aziraphale moved closer to him, and Crowley could tell that the angel was trying to dampen his light a little, so as not to overwhelm him. He reached out a divine hand, and Crowley felt a question being asked of him. He should say no, but he was weak. And if they annihilated each other, well, that was better than Heaven or Hell doing it to them.

Aziraphale’s hand rested on top of one of Crowley’s snaky heads. They did not combust. Their souls met gladly. The feeling was warm, it was golden. Compassion, love, and healing flowed forth from Aziraphale. He could never fix everything that was broken with Crowley, but as the angel’s soul washed through him, Crowley felt the edges of his pain blunted, his internal writhing calmed. Aziraphale’s love blanketed his shivering, exposed soul. Crowley tried feebly to push it away, being unworthy, but with the tenacity of a lion, the fierceness of an eagle, the solidity of an ox, Aziraphale asserted his love, and Crowley succumbed to it, basked in it.

It was more than a little overwhelming. There came from Aziraphale a wave of compassion and regret: if it was too much for Crowley, perhaps they should return to their more familiar corporations. Crowley assented. The roaring of Aziraphale’s wings diminished, the scents blew away, the light dimmed, and they were returning to their bodies.

But with the contact maintained between their souls, there was a moment of confusion as their extended beings filled back in to their Earthly forms. Crowley felt that he looked at his room through doubled eyes before he realized they were still a little mixed up. He sorted out the parts of him that hadn’t returned to the right body, and followed the contact through their hands until he was all in the right place. He felt Aziraphale doing the same.

Aziraphale released his hand, and the separation came as a shock, with a feeling of loss. Crowley closed his eyes, reflecting on what had just happened, cherishing it, noticing the places where Aziraphale’s healing touch had reduced his inner pain. Aziraphale shifted on the couch next to him, straightening his waistcoat and bowtie. He took a sip of wine and waited quietly for Crowley to recover himself.

The angel sat up with a start, setting down his wine glass. “Dear Crowley,” Aziraphale said. “I think I have an idea.” He fished the scrap of Agnes Nutter’s book out of his pocket, and read it again. ‘When all is said and all is done, ye must choose your faces wisely, for soon enough ye will be playing with fire.’ If they intend to do you in with holy water, this could mean hellfire for me.”

“Sounds about right,” Crowley said. “They never met a duality they didn’t like.”

“What if we traded corporations?” Aziraphale asked.

What a shocking idea, an angel inhabiting a demon’s body, and vice versa. It would’ve been an absurd proposal just half an hour ago. But they’d just proven it could be done. “The prophecy could be read that way,” Crowley said. “But do you think we can fool them?”

“We’ll just need to practice a bit first,” Aziraphale said, bouncing up off the couch. “Come,” he said, holding out a hand, already full of confidence that they’d hit upon the right path, his face alight.

His optimism was too damned endearing. Crowley opened his mouth intending to say “It’ll never work,” but instead he found himself taking Aziraphale’s hand and saying, “All right, let’s try it.”

“Ready, steady, go,” Aziraphale said, and they exerted themselves, and their souls were spilling past each other, through their clasped hands. Crowley poured into Aziraphale’s body, settling in to its comfortableness, its many layers of soft clothing, and at length he was looking out of Aziraphale’s eyes at his own body, at his own slitted eyes.

He watched his body pat itself. “My dear, you really should eat more, you’re so thin and cold,” his own face said with Aziraphale’s inflection.

“So eat, angel.” Crowley miracled them a charcuterie board and a refilled bottle of wine, and they set about the business of imitating each other’s mannerisms.

Crowley still dreaded what must be coming, but he was slightly less afraid. Whatever Heaven and Hell tried to do to them, he and Aziraphale would face it together.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not sure if this is slashfic or not. [It is canon compliant that GO is a love story](https://twitter.com/neilhimself/status/1168898289569341441), and I wanted to explore how that might be expressed by two inhuman beings.
> 
> Descriptions of Aziraphale's form are [Scripture-based](https://www.whyangels.com/seraphim_cherubim_creatures.html); those of Crowley's are not.


End file.
